Business Opportunities

The world of business is a huge world. It can really be anything you want. Without business, we wouldn’t have anything. From the business deal between a farmer and a grocery store for the milk you buy, to a website you got from a graphic designer, all areas involve some form of business.

Over the last few weeks, my business class has gone over several business opportunities. From service-based businesses such as car-washing to being an insurance agent, to online business opportunities such as copy-writing, blogging, graphic design and publishing, the possibilities are endless, really.

It is very hard to choose just one of them as something I would like to do, but I have picked two that kind of go together. These are photography and videography.

Opportunities and jobs in these two fields are pretty varied. For example, you could be someone who creates marketing videos for a company. Or you could be a photographer for National Geographic. Many times, a videographer can go on to work in Hollywood, filming movies, or even directing them. Or you can stay smaller and do videos for private people, filming occasions such as weddings, birthday parties, and graduations for your customer to later look back on.

Like in all fields of business, at least in my opinion, to be successful one would need to be a good people’s person. The ability to communicate clearly, effectively, yet friendly, is very important. Even when you work online, and not face-to-face, you still need to communicate. Therefore, the ability to write well, applies to all fields of business, not just if you plan to be an author, editor, publisher or copywriter.

For videography/photography in particular, a barrier-to-entry would be knowledge about cameras, lighting, and general techniques that will make the video, or picture, stand out and look professional.

One of the most important questions when starting out on a business venture is whether or not it is going to be profitable. This can depend on where you live, what type of business, if you can talk to people, and a lot of other things.

Videography/photography, from what I understand, can pay quite well. Take a wedding for example, you get paid a few thousand dollars to take the pictures, make a video of the day. As someone who creates videos promoting a company, you also receive a very large salary. So, depending on the area of business, you make more or less money. However, you can make anything you want if you work hard and really want it. A quote I like is,

“I bargained with Life for a penny,
And Life would pay no more,
However I begged at evening
When I counted my scanty store;

For Life is just an employer, He gives you what you ask, But once you have set the wages, Why, you must bear the task.

I worked for a menial’s hire, Only to learn, dismayed, That any wage I had asked of Life, Life would have paid.”

Lastly, I’d like to mention a website that I was showed. It is www.fiverr.com. You can use it for yourself, if you need something done. You could also use it to be an ‘employee’ in your own business. For example, if you’re a graphic designer and you have a client wanting a website, you could hire someone on fiverr to do the job and then tweak it yourself. Lastly, with fiverr you could be offering your own services on there. I thought it was a pretty cool website.

My mom’s a member of the PPA (Professional Photographers of America) and the MDPPA (Maryland Professional Photographers Association). Chances are they have a more local one in your area as well. You have to pay membership dues and for starting out with a bunch of other expenses it’s probably difficult to afford it, but once you’re on the road it’s not a bad place to look at, both for meeting other photographers and gaining knowledge on how to take better images. Both the local and national organizations have print competitions, which are judged on the twelve elements of a competition image. There is a brief guideline I will link to below but there are numerous rules within each category that also should be followed. It takes a lot of good equipment, editing software, and know-how in order to produce quality competition images, but it can really pay off in the PPA’s annual competitions where your images can go to the Loan collection (basically a super special photo album of professional photographers across the country). Lastly, if you do ever enter those competitions, try to enter images that you take specifically for competition. What works as a great client image is usually a poor competition image. Links are below

Thanks! Actually, maybe it came across that way but I’m not really going to start photography right now, even though I’d love too. I’m just too busy. I’m tutoring kids right now. Thanks though! I’ll keep that info. Your mom’s website is awesome!